1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to the technical field of process management and workflow environments on computer systems. More specifically, the present invention relates to an extension of a workflow environment and combining it with a reusable parts environment, both environments residing and being executable on a computer system.
2. Description of the Related Art
The processes of designing, developing and manufacturing a new product or changing an existing product presents many challenges to product managers and engineers who must bring the product to market for the least cost and within schedule while maintaining or even increasing product quality. Many companies are realizing that the conventional product design process is not satisfactory to meet these needs. They require early involvement of manufacturing engineering, cost engineering, logistic planning, procurement, manufacturing, service and support in the design effort. Furthermore, they require planning and control of product information through design, release, and manufacturing.
The correct and efficient execution of business processes within a company, e. g. development or production processes, is of enormous importance for a company and has significant influence on a company's overall success in the market place. Therefore, those processes have to be regarded similarly to technology processes and must be tested, optimized and monitored. The management of such processes is usually performed and supported by a computer based process or workflow management system.
In D. J. Spoon: "Project Management Environment", IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, Vol. 32, No. 9A, February 1990, pages 250 to 254, a process management environment is described including an operating environment, data elements, and application functions and processes.
In R. T. Marshak: "IBM's FlowMark, Object-Oriented Workflow for Mission-Critical Applications", Workgroup Computing Report (USA), Vol. 17, No. 5, 1994, page 3 to 13, the object character of IBM FlowMark as a client/server product built on a true object model that is targeted for mission-critical production process application development and deployment is described.
In H. A. Inniss and J. H. Sheridan: "Workflow Management Based on an Object-Oriented Paradigm", IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, Vol. 37, No. 3, March 1994, page 185, other aspects of object-oriented modelling for customization and changes are described.
In F. Leymann and D. Roller: "Business Process Management with FlowMark", Digest of papers, Cat. No. 94CH3414-0, Spring COMPCON 94, 1994, pages 230 to 234, the state-of-the-art computer process management tool, IBM FlowMark is described. The meta model of IBM FlowMark is presented as well as the implementation of IBM FlowMark. The possibilities of IBM FlowMark for modelling of business processes as well as their execution are discussed. The product IBM FlowMark is available for different computer platforms and documentation for IBM FlowMark is available in every IBM branch.
In F. Leymann: "A meta model to support the modelling and execution of processes", Proceedings of the 11th European Meeting on Cybernetics and System Research EMCR92, Vienna, Austria, Apr. 21 to 24, 1992, World Scientific 1992, pages 287 to 294, a meta model for controlling business processes is presented and discussed in detail.
The "IBM FlowMark for OS/2", document number GH 19-8215-01, IBM Corporation, 1994, available in every IBM sales office, represents a typical modern, sophisticated, and powerful workflow management system. It supports the modelling of business processes as a network of activities. This network of activities, the process model, is constructed as a directed, acyclic, weighted, colored graph. The nodes of the graph represent the activities which are performed. The edges of the graph, the control connectors, describe the potential sequence of execution of the activities. Definition of the process graph is via the IBM FlowMark Definition Language (FDL) or the built-in graphical editor. The runtime component of the workflow manager interprets the process graph and distributes the execution of activities to the right person at the right place, e. g. by assigning tasks to a work list according to the respective person, wherein said work list is stored as digital data within said workflow or process management computer system.
In F. Leymann and W. Altenhuber: "Managing business processes as an information resource", IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 32(2), 1994, the mathematical theory underlying the IBM FlowMark product is described.
In D. Roller: "Verification of Workflows in IBM FlowMark", in J. Becker und G. Vossen (Hrsg.): "Geschaeftsprozessmodellierung und Workflows", International Thompson Publishing, 1995, the requirement and possibility of the verification of workflows is described. Furthermore the feature of graphical animation for verification of the process logic is presented as it is implemented within the IBM FlowMark product.
For implementing a computer based process management system, the business processes have to be analyzed and, as the result of this analysis, a process model has to be constructed as a network of activities corresponding to the business process. In the IBM FlowMark product, the process models are not transformed into an executable. At run time, an instance of the process is created from the process model, called a process instance. This process instance is then interpreted dynamically by the IBM FlowMark product.
A previous patent application of the same applicant, application number PCT/EP 95/03345, titled "Method and Computer System For Generating Process Management Computer Programs From Process Models", teaches how a process graph can be transformed into a C++ program, if the process is consecutively executed by one user at a time at one location.
A further patent application of the same applicant, application number EP 96 105 010.1, titled "Method of Generating an Implementation of a Workflow Process Model in an Object Environment", teaches how to provide a new kind of extension for a process model within a workflow environment, triggering an automatic and computerized generation of an implementation of said process model within an object environment. Said implementation of said process model being executable on a computer system.
The technological area of reusable parts environments has become known for instance by the VisualAge product family offered by IBM. Detailed information on the principles and concepts of VisualAge can be found in various publications available through IBM branch offices. Examples are: "VISUALAGE: CONCEPTS AND FEATURES", document number GG24-3946-00, "VISUALAGE PROGRAMMER'S GUIDE TO BUILDING PARTS FOR FUN AND PROFIT", document number SC34-4496-01, "VISUALAGE C++ FOR OS/2 V3.0", document number GCO9-2235-00 and many more. Reusable parts environments support the building of new software from components. According to the component paradigm new composite components may be built by other components allowing the creation of building blocks of increasing complexity and abstraction. VisualAge's visual programming tools allow applications to be composed, customized, and assembled in a visual way by using a graphical editor. By allowing the combination of parts visually, without writing procedural code, the visual tools take away much of the tedium and error-prone details of application programming, especially user interface programming, allowing concentration on the essential capabilities of an application.
Construction from parts refers to the ability to create application programs by combining existing software components rather than creating the logic of an application from scratch.
Currently workflow process environments, like FlowMark, are separate environments without any relation to the-reusable part environments, like VisualAge. Also the visual programming capabilities available within reusable parts environments are not available within workflow process environments.